8/3/2019 Hhs Mandate

1/2

1 2 3 4...Te Issue

On August 1, 2011, Kathleen Sebelius, theSecretary o Health and Human Services (HHS)

proposed that all employers should be requiredto provide ree contraception, sterilization andabortion-inducing drug coverage or all employees.On January 20, 2012, the oending regulation wasissued. Almost immediately, a storm o protest arose.

In response, President Obama proposed that thiscost be borne by insurance companies, not directlyby employers. As we shall see, his proposal does notsolve any o the problems the mandate raises.

Problem #1Contraceptives Are Carcinogens.

In 1999, the International Agency or Research onCancer (IARC) o the World Health Organization,

concluded [c]ombined oral contraceptives arecarcinogenic to humans Class I carcinogens.1 Tiswas rearmed in 2005. Class I carcinogens includethings like rst- and second-hand tobacco smoke,benzene, ormaldehyde, and plutonium. Hormonalcontraceptives are virtually the only drugs on the list.

Despite this act, many doctors still routinely

prescribe the pill or a variety o conditions, rangingrom acne to birth control.

Just as the Catholic Church does not pay or heremployees cigarettes, so the Church does not pay orher employees birth control. It is absurd that anyone

would orce employers to pay or carcinogens thatwill injure women and kill children.

Problem #2Contraceptives reat Pregnancy As A Disease

Medicine heals bodily deects or illnesses.echnological devices, such as crutches or

wheelchairs, compensate or human weakness. Whatillness does birth control correct? What weakness is

present in a womans correctly unctioning biolog y?

1 http://monographs.iarc.r/ENG/Monographs/vol72/index.php

Birth control devices and drugs assume thatnormal women are dangerous. Women must bemechanically or chemically neutered. Birth controlassumes emale ertility is evil. Te use o birth controlis essentially misogynistic. Tis hatred o women is

precisely what the Church has always ought.

Problem #3:Contraceptives Cause Abortion

Hormonal contraceptives have several modes oaction. Tey can prevent ovulation. Tey can alsothin the uterine lining.

Contraceptives ofen ail to prevent ovulation. When the released egg is ertilized, it becomes anembryo in the upper one-third o the Fallopian tube.About six days later, the embryonic child reaches the

womb. Upon arrival, s/he cannot implant becausethe contraceptive has destroyed the wombs lining.Te result? Death via chemically-induced abortion.

Some say pregnancy only begins at implantation.Tis is alse. For nearly 150 years, science has knownlie begins with conception, the union o sperm andegg. Tis act is the oundation o the science oembryology.2 So why argue or implantation?

In 1978, a biologist created and successullyimplanted the worlds rst human test-tube baby.Critics pointed out the oolishness o impregnating aPetri dish. Tus, those who intended to make money

by creating and selling children through IVF had tochange the terminology. Tey began insisting that

pregnancy only begins at implantation. oday, overthirty years later, embryologists still reuse to goalong with this money-hungry perversion o science.

Problem #4Te Mandate Violates Federal Law

Te HHS mandate not only circumvents the HydeAmendment, which prohibits the Department o

2 http://www.prolie.com/lie_begins.html;http://www.princeton.edu/~prolie/articles/embryoquotes2.html

Health and Human Services rom unding abortion,it also violates the Religious Freedom RestorationAct (RFRA), which specically protects individuals,including employers, rom any government mandatethat excessively burdens the exercise o religion. Teterm exercise o religion is dened broadly to meanany exercise o religion, whether or not compelledby, or central to, a system o relig ious belie. 3

Problem #5President Obamas Broken Promises

On Friday, Feb. 11, 2012, President Obamasaid he had accommodated Catholic institutions byshifing the burden o ree contraceptive coverageto the insurance carriers. But, scant hours aer heannounced his amed accommodation, he releasedthe actual regulations. Tey were, in act, unchanged:

Accordingly, the amendment to the interimnal rule with comment period amending 45CFR 147.130(a)(1)(iv) which was publishedin the Federal Register at 76 FR 46621-46626on August 3, 2011, is adopted as a fnal rulewithout change. [Emphasis added.]4

Te nal rule does contain a non-binding promise toconsider changes. Such promises are not new.

Back in March, 2010, President Obama hadissued an Executive Order with which he had likewise

assured lawmakers that his new Health Care ReormAct would not und contraceptives or abortion.Neither promise seems likely to be kept.5

Problem #6Te Mandate Will Break Catholic Hospitals

25% o the nations hospitals are Catholic.Catholic hospitals care or 1 in 6 Americans, manyo them poor. In act, Catholic theology requires3 http://www.eppc.org/publications/pubID.4654/pub_detail.asp4 http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/290859/nothing-

squid-ink-ed-haislmaier5 http://aclj.org/obamacare/obama-promise-no-abortion-und-ing-obamacare-just-magic-trick

8/3/2019 Hhs Mandate

2/2

8

EightProblems

WithTe

HHSMandate

567hospitals to maintain an enormous line item just orcharity, i.e. ree medical services to the poor.

I a Catholic hospital is orced to spend millionso dollars in nes or reusing to violate Catholicdoctrine, those millions o dollars will not be availableto serve the poor.

Te HHS mandate is a direct attack on the poor.It will strip Catholic medical care away rom the most

impoverished neighborhoods and leave those poorpeople vulnerable to illness, disease and death.

By accepting the HHS mandate, the patientsin these Catholic hospitals may very well beautomatically rendered ineligible or any ederalassistance. But reusal o the mandate entails payingmassive nes which will also strip services rom the

poor. Either way, everyone loses.

Problem #7

Te Mandate Violates Religious ConscienceMost Catholic organizations either sel-insure

or use Catholic insurance companies. Catholicorganizations, whether charities or insurancecompanies, cannot be compelled to violate the Faith.

In act, no Catholic can be compelled to dothis. Catholics run not just charities or insurancecompanies, but all kinds o businesses. A CatholicCEO has the right to run her business in a way thatdoes not violate her own conscience, even i her

business has no direct connection to teaching orspreading the Catholic Faith.

Some claim that 98% o Catholic women supportthe HHS mandate because they all use birth control.Both statistic and conclusion are alse. Both are basedon a single, unreplicated study rom the GuttmacherInstitute, ormerly an arm o Planned Parenthood.6

Te Guttmacher analysis involved women aged15-44 who (a) had sex in the last three months and(b) were trying to avoid pregnancy. Most o the

Catholic women in the survey were not married. Is

6 http://www.guttmacher.org/pubs/Religion-and-Contraceptive-Use.pd

it any surprise that women who did not live Catholicteaching on sex and marriage largely didnt ollowCatholic teaching on sex and contraception? But,even that wasnt enough. o get their 98%, advocateshad to count women who did not care i they became

pregnant, and who thereore were not using birthcontrol, as part o those who were using birth control.So, the HHS mandate orces Catholic employers to

pay or the actions o employees who actively violateCatholic teachings.

Americans o every aith and political persuasionoppose the HHS mandate.7 Tis includes: Doug Kmiec, President Obamas own Catholic

Ambassador to Malta, who has said he now hasno candidate he can vote or in 2012.

Te Orthodox Bishops o America, More than 40 Protestants groups, Orthodox Jewish Congregations o America, Every Catholic bishop who leads a diocese.

Problem #8Te Mandate Violates the Constitution

When government grants us money, it doesntmean government has bought our rights. Students

who receive educational grants cannot have theirreedom o speech curtailed or their right to bear armscurtailed on that basis. Similarly, the government hasno right to strip us o reedom o conscience.

President Obama has no Constitutional right, nomoral or legal right, to impose this mandate. It mustbe abolished.

7http://www.becketund.org/wp-content/uploads/2011/12/o-President-NonCatholics-RelExemptionSigned.pd

2901 Country Place Dr., Plano, TX 75075

BridegroomPress.com

info@bridegroompress.com

Phone: 877-348-6195 Fax: 630-689-9037